LEAF and 3DF bring out the stars: visual effects experts and animators, particularly those working in 3D, convene in London to salute—and dissect—the year's best work - English Beat - London Effects and Animation Festival

Post, Dec, 2002 by Ken McGorry

LONDON -- This event felt like the center of the 3D animation universe. It's not California, but the organizers seemed to have moved that state of the art here for the nonce. LEAF, the long running London Effects and Animation Festival (owned by Advanstar Communications, also the parent of Post Magazine), partnered this year with the 3DFestival, really did give attendees the sense that they were in the middle of things. And there was no shortage of Californians milling about the three-day conference; ILM had a high headcount of guest speakers on hand, and Sony Pictures Imageworks was well represented. Pixar had a speaker, as did Digital Domain, DreamWorks, The Walt Disney Company and Tippett Studio, as well as Yankee Easterners from Blue Sky and the Jim Henson Creature Shop. Weta in New Zealand and MacGuff in Paris were also represented.

But the conference's decidedly British accent was heard from an impressive array of local talent, including people from Framestore, Moving Picture Company, Glassworks, Aardman Animation, Passion Pictures, Cine-site London, VTR and more.

Set at London's Olympia hall last October, LEAF and the annual Digital Media World conference that wraps around it had plenty of room for a spacious exhibit floor, nearly 6,000 attendees and a large staging area for the three days of LEAF/3DF's technical presentations. This year, Advanstar's DMW show partnered with Future Publishing's Digital Arts fest and concocted a new acronym, DAW for Digital Arts World. Part of the reason for this festival of acronyms was the unambiguous message sent earlier this year from the effects and animation market at large: they couldn't handle two similar conferences in quick succession. So the two companies took the diplomatic and business-savvy route and joined forces as somewhat strange bedfellows.

THE PANELS

DAW was not kidding about the "digital." I personally hosted a day of presentations by speakers from ILM, Sony Pictures Image-works, and Glassworks. Most of this day's sessions attracted at least 500 attendees.

First up was an in-depth presentation by Ben Snow, visual effects supervisor on one of the three teams ILM put together to create effects for Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones. (ILM also won the LEAF award for best movie effects for SW2.) Oscar-winner Dennis Muren worked with Snow on such intricate sequences as the "Droid Factory" and much of the action on the dusty planet (that's volumetric dust) Geonosis, including the climactic battle involving the clones. (John Knoll's ILM team handled the dramatic "execution" sequence staged in the Geonosis arena.)

There are about 550 people credited in the making of Episode 2 and Snow oversaw a crew of about 150. With realism as his goal, the look and workings of the Droid Factory are based on video footage Snow shot in a real foundry and factory. The spraying sparks, the clank of heavy machinery and the conveyor belts, all were worked into the complex scene in SW2. Snow was followed by two ILM computer graphics software engineers who really got into the intricacies of making Episode 2 come to life, Ari Rapkin and David Bullock.

Rapkin's specialty on the film was designing proprietary software that emulated the soft folds and movement of real cloth costumes. Bullock went the other way -- his in-house tools gave the "rigid body" robots, flying machines and other animated vehicles their movement, and their own physics.

Later; ILM veteran animation director Tom Bertino took the stage to discuss his work on Men in Black II.

Glassworks managing director Hector McCloud was the day's keynote speaker. (Glassworks also shared the LEAF award for best commercial animation with Framestore.) McCloud showed an old reel of classic Glassworks effects and animation (remember Peter Gabriel's Steam video?) and then pointed out how antiquated even the most sophisticated commercial work can seem just a few years later. His sentiments were echoed by Bruce Steele, Glassworks' director of visual effects, who summed up with the showing of a new, fully computer animated music video by Bjork that culminates in the formation of a human embryo.

A packed house remained for the day's final presentation -- a dissection of the computer animation work Sony Pictures Imageworks put into the creation of Tobey Maguire's digital double in Spider-Man. Lead animator Spencer Cook led the audience through Imageworks' process of determining how a man imbued with a mutant spider's radioactive genes might move: first, up the brick wall of a tenement and later, as a more confident superhero, swinging through the air above a Manhattan avenue. He showed footage of the movements of various animals that ultimately contributed to Spidey's style of ascending a building without using the stairs. Imageworks also took the prize at LEAF for its first animated short, The ChubbChubbs. (Turn to page 10 for the story on the making of The ChubbChubbs.)

Advanstar and Future say they will collaborate again next year with a new DAW/LEAF show to be set at Earls Court October 28 through 30.